The Encounter (2)
The moment I recognized that the woman standing before me was the Goddess, what followed was not conversation but a single cleaving stroke — the hand axe sweeping down in a diagonal arc from upper right to lower left, a blow that even the angel behind me, stunned dumb by my cursing, could not stop.
Because she was a Goddess. Because she was a being that stood above every other existence — naturally, I hadn't expected my attack to actually land. That is... I wouldn't have, normally. But reason had burned away in my rage, and there was no chance such a thought could have come first. There was only one thing in my head: tearing that Goddess's body apart, limb from limb.
The hand axe buried itself deep in the woman's fragile-looking shoulder. Even then she did not lift her head, did not loose so much as a single scream — as if none of this meant anything at all. And that placid reaction of hers drove me madder still. In her I could even glimpse the air of a penitent accepting, as rightfully owed, the punishment she was due, while from her small lips the apologies kept spilling without end.
[I'm sorry... I'm sorry...]
Shut up... shut up, SHUT UP!!!
I seized the axe where it hung embedded in her shoulder, wrenched it free, and cleaved the air again — faster this time than before.
Thwack— Crack—
From her right shoulder to her left, the axe tore loose from my hand once more and hung suspended in midair, and I refused to tolerate it, snatching it back out again. Once, twice, three times — and on the fourth, the hand axe went on burying itself and ripping free, over and over.
Crunch— Squelch—
[Ghhh... aaagh...]
Every time a scream tore from her mouth, the corners of my lips curled a little higher. A hand axe's edge can't even cut through a human body more than a few times before it's ruined — so it stood to reason that a blade which had carved through a god's flesh again and again had been ground down past all saving. Even so, my rage was not the kind to be spent on so little. I hurled the ruined axe to the floor, closed the distance, and hammered my fist into the frail woman's belly.
It sank in, deep and soft, like a punch into a rubber ball. From the woman who had chanted nothing but apologies until this very moment came the sound of dry retching — and in exact inverse proportion, my mood improved, just a little.
Wham— Crack— Squelch—
My beating did not stop at her belly. Face, arms, legs — every part of her my eyes could find was visited in its turn, and nothing escaped, down to parts as small as her eyeballs.
[Ghh... ghhhnnngh...]
Her once snow-white, beautiful belly was now stamped with bruises in the shape of knuckles. Her nose had caved in; both arms were broken clean through. Legs that had once boasted a graceful line were bent in directions no leg should bend, and in the throat that had made that lovely voice, three daggers stood buried to the hilt.
"...Say something. Anything at all."
[I'm... sorryyy...]
"Doesn't sound much like a last will and testament to me."
[It's... it's all my faaault...]
Insane bitch.
A short laugh escaped me — pfft — and then I stomped down with everything I had on the head of the woman lying there so wretchedly, hard enough to burst it like rotten fruit. Only, what ended up beneath my foot was not her head.
Looking to the side, I saw the goddess — still unable to move, moaning softly — and another her, cradling her tenderly in her arms. Bright blonde hair and white feathers, streaming just as before. The one who had been guiding me only moments ago.
"...What are you doing?"
"..."
"Oh — was it rather hard to watch? If so, we could move somewhere else..."
"...Even so, she is my... no, our Mother."
"...And what exactly would you have me do about that?"
"Please... just hear her out. Once."
No.
So what if there were circumstances? Whatever reasons she might have had, I had no intention of forgiving her.
By way of refusal, I flung the axe at the head of the prone goddess — and it was turned aside by a hair's breadth.
[Move aside... Michael.]
"Mo...ther?!"
[They are my sins, my karma — debts that must rightly be paid...]
By the time I noticed, her body had been restored whole, and the goddess they called Mother shoved aside the angel called Michael and came toward me. A goddess revered by all for the mere fact of her existence — and to me, a thing more repulsive and vile than anything in creation. And that woman was now walking slowly toward me.
In the eyes that gazed at me settled an ashen regret. In her graceful, dignified gestures, remorse. In the damp, drawn-out tails of her words, an aching echo. In the lovely voice that reached my ears, grief. And yet the footsteps bearing down on me never stopped — and so my instinctive revulsion, and blades honed sharp with grudge, came swinging out to meet her.
The flying edges punched clean through her body. A cold blue blade sank into those once-beautiful eyes, and the axe's edge claimed her elegant fingers one after another. The bitter smile that had lingered at her lips was gone before I knew it, and the lovely voice that reached me carried not sorrow now, but agony. Even so, she did not stop coming.
To halt her advance I severed the tendons of her legs; I drove a hand axe straight through her knee; I even pinned leg to leg with rods of steel — and still her steps toward me showed no sign of stopping.
"...Don't come near me."
[...]
Because she kept advancing on me without a shred of hesitation, my body gave ground, one step at a time.
"I said don't come any closer!!"
[...]
Every step I retreated, she came two closer. I even tried grinding her legs to pulp outright, but somehow she was upright again before I knew it, still coming. Naturally, this was her chamber — the space was finite — and the moment I had nowhere left to retreat, she closed the distance without hesitation.
Just as I resolved to simply punch through her throat, her utterly unexpected action stunned me for a beat.
[I-I'm sorry... hnn...]
"...?"
[P-please... just once... hear me out...]
She squared her hands neatly together and bowed so low toward me that her forehead pressed against the ground — the gesture that anyone from the twenty-first century would have called dogeza.
"Mo...ther?!"
[J-just once... please, hear me ouuut...]
"..."
And she did it before a mere creature who called her Mother. Wearing the noble title of Goddess, she bowed her head to me — nothing more than one of her creations. With a voice that wavered, ill-befitting that title, and a figure that trembled even as it pressed against the floor.
Michael soon collected herself and tried to raise the goddess — but met the goddess's stubbornness head-on and drew back with a face on the verge of tears. In a situation where I had somehow been cast as the villain, I screwed up my expression and vented the fury in my chest by grinding my foot down, irritably, on the head before me.
"Why... why only now, of all times?"
[Ah... ugh...]
If I had grabbed any passerby off the street and asked what they heard in my voice just now, I suspect every last one of them would have answered the same.
"Even when I wailed out to that god like that."
With a wet crunch, something gave way beneath my foot.
"Even when I believed, without a shadow of doubt, that someday you would save my life."
I could no longer rein in the right foot that carried more of my feeling with every blow. The rhythm of my stomping quickened; the weight behind it grew heavier still.
"Even when I strained to remember every wrong I had ever committed, and repented for them all."
As the twitching of her head dwindled, my right foot seemed to lose interest and went hunting elsewhere, trampling its way down her body in turn — right hand, back, waist, both shoulders, sparing nothing.
"Even when I had finally lost every last hope and wished for death, you said nothing — and now, NOW of all times, you—!!!!!"
[Ahh... hnn...]
"And NOW you pull this bullshit?"
My right foot, every ounce of strength behind it, struck the back of her skull where she still held her posture. Her head met the floor with a resounding crack — and my own ankle, snapped by the recoil, came into view. Beside me, Michael, the goddess gathered into her arms once more, seized my left leg.
"P-please. I'm begging you."
"..."
"The Mother as she is now... is no mere avatar. If this goes on, she will truly reach death..."
"..."
"So please... couldn't you take my life in her place?"
With those words she prostrated herself in exactly the same posture as the goddess — lest anyone doubt they were mother and daughter. The voice cracking with tears came free of charge.
"Do you know my circumstances as well?"
"...Yes."
"Then you know perfectly well that the answer is no."
"Please... just hear her out. Even once."
Watching a beautiful woman beg and plead in a voice past desperation into earnestness was not a sight that pleased the eye. But neither did I have any intention of forgiving that fucking bitch.
Paying no mind to the woman clinging to my left leg, I advanced on the goddess, who held her prostrate posture without moving.
"P-please... please..."
"..."
Dragging Michael along the floor behind me, I reached the goddess and seized her by the hair, rough and merciless. Strands of that beautiful hair came away in my fist, and a moan of pain spilled from her lips unbidden.
"What is it you want?"
[...]
"You must have a reason for pulling this act now, after all this time."
[T-to talk... ahh...]
"Then speak plainly."
Even when I wrenched her hair tighter — my way of saying cut the nonsense — the words that spilled from her mouth did not change. That she wished to talk. That if I would only listen, she would accept whatever I did to her afterward, gladly. That if I could not bring myself to trust her, she would stake a contract upon the god's true name itself.
However many times I snarled no and flung her head away, Michael kept tugging at my trouser leg, and the goddess seemed ready to lie there like a block of stone until I relented. Before I knew it, two beauties were hanging off me — and sick to death of the whole situation, I slammed the goddess's head into the floor and opened my mouth.
"...Make it short."
[Y-yes!!]
"Th-thank you."
I told myself it was only listening — but the self-consolation did nothing to stop the disgust from curdling in my gut.